Back on the Map

by Lisa Ann Scott

  I tiptoed into Parker’s room and shook him awake. “Time to go,” I whispered.

  We ate cereal and shoved some granola bars and apples into our backpacks. We stuffed our blankets and pillows in garbage bags and set them in our wagon. Then I went back inside to leave a note for Grauntie.

  Thanks for taking care of us. Hope you get better soon. Sorry we couldn’t say goodbye.

  Love,

  Penny and Parker

  As we headed toward town, I decided we should get a few last meals from the Carlsons. The breakfast crowd was just starting to file in as I parked our cart outside the diner. I took in four critters, hoping for eight meals.

  These were the last critters I’d probably ever give to the Carlsons.

  Mrs. Carlson spotted us right away. “You children are here quite early.”

  “We’ve got a big day ahead of us, so we thought we’d stop by and get some food to tide us through.” I glanced at Parker so he’d know not to say anything about our plans. “I’ve got critters to trade.”

  Smiling, she walked over. “You never run out of ideas, do you?”

  “I guess not.” It made me sad to think of everything we were leaving behind in the shed. Would I ever have the chance to make another critter again?

  She took all the critters from me and spent a while examining them. “How could I ever say no to one of your creations? Come on up to the counter and tell me what you’d like.”

  My mouth watered just thinking of the Carlsons’ great food. Was this the last time we’d ever taste it? “Four BLT plates would be great, and four of yesterday’s specials—to go?”

  “Wow, that’s a big order.”

  “I know.”

  “Sounds good. That’ll be coming right up,” Mrs. Carlson said.

  I took a moment to soak in the memories of the place. To memorize the red-checked tablecloths, and the creamers on each table shaped like mooing cows. I studied each tin can critter sitting on the shelf on the wall. Would anyone ever love my critters as much as the Carlsons did?

  Mrs. Carlson came out with our Styrofoam boxes and set them on the counter. “How about a hug?”

  Parker pushed in front of me and held open his arms. Mrs. Carlson hugged him, rocking him back and forth. “Bye,” he said, his voice thick.

  Then she turned to me. “I’ll see you soon, Penny.”

  I walked into her hug, trying to memorize the feel of her arms around me, the way my head would fit under her chin if I really snuggled into it. But I still pulled away quickly.

  “Bye.” I grabbed our boxes and hurried out the door, pushing away all the bad feelings piling up inside.

  Parker followed and, once we were outside, he helped me find a place in the cart for the food. “So, where do we go now?” he asked.

  “I figure we can walk out of town and head into the woods.” I sighed, looking up and down the street, deciding which way to go. “There’s that creek nearby we could use for water. We’ll have to make a shelter. Let’s get going.”

  But Parker stood there, staring at New Hope’s Finest. “It’s too bad that place wasn’t still an orphanage. Then we could stay there, and we’d never have to leave.”

  My skin prickled. He was right. We did belong at that orphanage. That’s where we would’ve ended up, years ago, especially with our talents. A girl who could see people in shades would certainly have been welcome there. Nobody would’ve found it strange that Parker could find missing things. Maybe that’s why New Hope had always felt like home. We were meant to be here, all along. “Parker, you’re a genius!”

  “I know. But, why?”

  I shook my head, laughing. “We can stay there. In the basement! No one goes down there, so no one will ever know. We’ll be warm at night, and we can sneak out when we need to. It’s perfect!” I twirled in place. “Let’s go to the grocery store and stock up on some more food before we move in.”

  After getting peanut butter and bread and cookies and granola bars and water with our ten dollars from the silverware, Parker and I untied our wagons, carried them up the front stairs, and brought them inside. It took a while to bring everything down to the basement, but we did it just in time. Right after we brought the wagons down, we heard footsteps overhead.

  Half the basement was filled with mechanical stuff, like the furnace and pipes and boxes and cleaning supplies. The other half was a big, open room with cement walls painted white, though not a fresh shade of white. More like the color of lost hope. There were two doors along the back wall, one closed, one open. The open one led to a bathroom with a shower and several stalls. Miss Meriwether had said the plumbing and electric had been fixed, so hopefully they worked. I went to the closed door and wrapped my fingers around the doorknob, curious about what was inside. I felt a shock when I touched the metal and snapped my hand back. What’s in there? I wondered, not ready to find out. This big room would do for now.

  It was totally empty, but the gray cement floor was dusty, and cobwebs hung from the ceiling like decorations from a sad, sad party years past. Luckily, we found a few brooms and rags so we could clean up. No sign of spiders, bugs, or mice, so that was good news, too.

  After shaking out a big tarp we’d found with the supplies, we laid it on the floor and unpacked our things. We spread out our blankets and pillows for beds. Parker was hungry already, so we each ate one of the Carlsons’ meals.

  “What now?” Parker asked.

  I shrugged. “Read a book. Draw a picture.”

  Sighing, he grabbed a book and sat up against a wall to read.

  I looked around. It wasn’t perfect, but we were together.

  There were no windows in the basement, so we could turn on the light without anyone outside noticing. We left them on when it was time for bed. Even so, Parker snuggled up right next to me when we went to sleep. Just like at Grauntie’s, I spent most of the night staring at the ceiling.

  “When can we go outside?” Parker asked the next morning, after we had each had a granola bar and water for breakfast.

  “I’m not sure. We don’t want to get caught now, do we? We should stay down here a while before risking it.”

  I read a few chapters of Notable People, but my fingers were itching to create. Sure wished I would’ve brought paint or crayons. I only had paper and a pencil.

  Parker walked the perimeter of the room, counting to himself quietly.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Counting my steps. Sixty-two, sixty-three. Trying to see if I take the same number each time around.”

  I wished we could creep upstairs and look through the building again, just to see everyone’s creations. Seemed a shame to have something so wonderful right over our heads and not be able to enjoy it.

  With Parker pacing, it was hard to concentrate on my book. Finally, he tumbled down onto his blanket and pillows beside me. “I’m hungry.”

  I looked at my watch. “Lunch isn’t for another three hours.”

  His jaw dropped. “But I want it now!”

  “Parker, you’d eat all our food in one day if I let you. We’ve got to make it stretch.” I still wasn’t sure how to go about getting more food once our supply was gone.

  “I’m hungry,” he moaned, carrying out the “y” sound for at least a minute.

  “Fine. Eat an apple for now. But that’s all.”

  Keeping Parker amused was the hardest part of living on our own. And that was after only one full day! When I wasn’t reading him books or drawing him pictures, I closed my eyes and listened to the footsteps overhead, imagining the people who might be up there. I made up stories for Parker about who was visiting.

  “Oh, my, these people sound like they’re from Texas! I’m sure those are cowboy boots clunking. I’ll bet they have a trailer full of horses and they stopped for a break. Betcha Mrs. Carlson will give them some carrots and sugar cubes if they stop by.”

  “I miss her.” Parker sniffed.

  “Well, we can’t go saying hello now, can
we? We’ll get busted and sent off to foster homes. Or worse. Maybe we’ll get sent to jail for running away.”

  He stood and balled his fists. “I don’t want to stay here anymore. I want a real bed. In a house. With someone like the Carlsons.”

  I shook my head, and softened my voice. “They don’t want us. Nobody wants us. Do you want to get split up?”

  Parker crinkled his eyebrows and shrugged a little.

  I swallowed hard. “You don’t care if we’re together? We’re all we’ve got.”

  He said nothing.

  Felt like someone kicked me in the shin. “You don’t care if you never see me again?” I could barely get the words out.

  “I do.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked down. “But we’re too little to live by ourselves, Penny.”

  I stomped my foot. “We’re not! Look at everything we did at Grauntie’s. And Parker, if we leave this place …” I swallowed hard. “I might never see you again.”

  He shrugged. “Or maybe you will.”

  “No. We’re staying here.” I shook my head.

  He jammed his fists on his hips. “Why do you always get to decide everything?”

  “I don’t.”

  “Yes, you do. You make all the decisions. I’m sick of being bossed around. I don’t care what Mama’s letter says. I want to leave!” Parker started crying. Little hiccup cries that I knew would turn into sobbing—fast. “It smells funny down here, and I’m cold!” His voice was getting louder.

  Oh, no. He was going to fall into one of his fits. Someone might hear us!

  I grabbed his baby blanket out of my backpack and took Parker by the hand, pulling him into the mystery room in hopes of muffling his cries. I fumbled along the wall near the doorway for a light switch and flicked it on, then closed the door behind us. Luckily, the doorknob didn’t zap me that time.

  He sat against the door, and I kneeled in front of him, stroking his arms with the blanket. How could I ever let him go to a home without me? No one else would know how to take care of him. No one else would understand his fits. No one else could look at him and know what he was thinking, like I could. He was wrong. We had to stay together—no matter what. I wrapped my arms around him, rocking him back and forth until he was calm.

  He sucked in a breath.“Wow, look at all those paintings.” He pointed behind me.

  I turned and looked at the wall behind us. “Oh, my gosh.” I stood for a closer look. It was entirely covered with artwork—paintings right on the wall, some of them right over other paintings. They weren’t just silly doodles, either. They were really good paintings, of people and animals and landscapes. All different styles, so they must’ve been done by different people. Different kids, I supposed. The kids who once lived here. It reminded me of Carly’s mural room upstairs.

  Parker stood and examined the art, too. It was a long wall with dozens and dozens of pictures.

  I traced my fingers along the cold wall, wondering about the children who had made these creations. And why was all this artwork locked up where no one could see it?

  “Penny, I think you should come here.” His voice sounded odd.

  “Why?”

  “Because there’s a picture of Mama.”

  CHAPTER 25

  I’d heard about people’s blood going cold, but I’d never known what it meant. Now I did. “What?”

  “Come look. It’s her.”

  With a thumping heart, I walked over to the other end of the room where he stood. I sucked in a breath. At first I thought it was a photo. But, no, it was a painting that looked like a real photograph. In the painting, Mama was smiling, and her red hair was piled up in a bun on top of her head. And she was holding a young man’s hand.

  A man covered in freckles like mine. A man with brown skin like mine.

  I looked at Parker, and he looked at me. We didn’t even need to say it. That man was Wren.

  I wanted to hate him, but I couldn’t. His face was so young, and full of love and hope. He didn’t look like a killer. He looked like someone who had no idea he was going to make a heartbreaking mistake. Like someone who just wanted to be loved. We had that in common, at least.

  In the painting, Mama and Wren stood in the yard in front of the orphanage. Other people filled the background, and it took me a moment to realize that Mama seemed to glow. Wren, too. The other people in the background were faded, some in black and white. Some almost invisible. Was that just me seeing that?

  “Parker, do Mama and Wren look like they’re glowing to you?”

  He studied the picture. “Yeah, they do. Guess Wren could see people in shades like you. So you’re not the only one.”

  My heart swelled. Then I counted the freckles on Wren’s face, one by one. One hundred seventy-two, some of them in big blotches like mine.

  We were connected. The good parts and the bad. But the sadness of knowing what he’d done had curled up and buried itself in my heart. It would be with me always. And I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to look at the Carlsons the same way again. It was probably a good thing I wouldn’t have to see them anymore.

  I moved over to Mama’s side of the picture and traced my finger over her smile. “I sure do miss you, Mama,” I whispered. It had been years since I’d seen that smile. “Parker and I have nowhere to go but this dank basement.” A sob threatened to sneak up my throat, but I swallowed it back down. “Please, Mama or Wren, help us. Please show me what to do.”

  I sat on the floor for a long time, examining that picture. A part of me wanted to dash up the stairs out of the building and run right to Joe’s house to ask him about it. But then we’d be busted for sure. Busted, and broken up. Then I wouldn’t have any family at all—just me.

  When I finally joined Parker in the other room, we didn’t talk about Wren or Mama. We didn’t say much of anything.

  After dinner, we read for a while, and Parker eventually dozed off. I covered him up with a blanket. Then I grabbed my family tree paper and added a name over on my daddy’s side: Wren. I curled up with the tree next to me and fell asleep.

  “Penny, you can’t stay here.”

  I jolted awake and hugged my blanket around me. A woman was squatting next to me, about five feet away. She was black, with her hair piled on top of her head. She looked familiar, but not from town. “Who are you?” I asked.

  She smiled. “I’m on your family tree. Ida B. Wells. And I know what you’re going through.”

  I blinked at her. “You refused to give up your seat on a train, years before Mrs. Rosa Parks refused to do it on a bus.” I remembered more of the story from my book. “And you fought hard to stop black people from being lynched, right?”

  “That’s right. But long before all that, I became an orphan like you. Yellow fever killed my parents and baby brother when I was sixteen, and my relatives wanted to split up me and my brothers and sisters.”

  I sniffed sadly. “How awful.”

  “It was. So I know your pain. And I don’t blame you one bit for hiding down in this basement, doing everything you can to stay together. I had to stop my schooling to care for my siblings so we wouldn’t be separated. But, Penny, I was older than you, and I had help from friends and family.”

  I looked down, not willing to meet the truth in her eyes.

  “And now your family’s here to help you,” said a man. “You asked for your family’s help, right?”

  I looked up and nodded.

  He was standing next to Miss Ida. He was black, with cropped hair, wearing a suit and a bow tie. “Who are you?” I asked.

  “You put me on your family tree after a bad day at school. You figured if I could walk most of the five hundred miles I had to travel to get to college, you could make it through another day at New Hope Elementary. If I could open my own school, you could suffer through another day of fourth grade.”

  Looking down at my family tree, I scanned the names. “Booker T. Washington!” I looked up, and now there were more people in the roo
m. Startled, I scrambled backward until I bumped into the wall. “I don’t understand.”

  A black woman squatted next to me. “You wanted us to be your family, Penny, and now we’re here to help.”

  I studied her for a moment. “You’re the lady who invented all the beauty products for black ladies.”

  “That’s right. I’m Sarah Breedlove Walker.”

  I squeezed my arms around my legs tighter.

  “You’re an inventor, like me,” she said, smiling. “Did you know I was an orphan, too?”

  I nodded. “Your parents died when you were seven.” I looked around at all the people in the room. Parker was still snoozing away. “Is this a dream?” I asked. “Or are you real?”

  Sarah reached out and cupped my cheek. “What do you think?”

  I gulped, saying nothing.

  Sarah pulled her hand away, smiling. “Life wasn’t always easy for me, but I never lived in an old basement with no one to look after me. You can’t stay here.”

  “I slept on a dirt floor as a child,” Booker T. Washington said, looking around the room. “This isn’t much better.”

  “But if we leave, Parker and I will get separated.” A stupid tear slipped down my cheek. “He’s all I’ve got.”

  Another woman walked toward me, and I quickly recognized her: Harriet Tubman. “I know it’s scary,” she said. “I led slaves north to freedom over a dozen times. It was always frightening, the prospect of getting caught. And this here is a perfect place to hide, like the stops I made on the Underground Railroad. But it’s not a place to stay. Not for good, child.”

  I looked around at all the people filling the room now: Daniel Boone, Rosa Parks, Carlos Juan Finlay … I recognized them all.

  I gritted my teeth, angry that they were right. We couldn’t stay down here forever. “So what should we do? Sit in the street like Gandhi so they won’t take us?” I scanned the packed room looking for him. “Is he here? He’s on my tree.” I spotted him in the crowd, waving at me from the back corner. I waved back.